thinking outside the box with season extension

Season extension @

Kilpatrick Family Farm

Soils for Season Extension

• The best soil for season extension is the soil that you currently have...... But...

Soils

• Sandy loam to Sandy is ideal

• Too sandy can be hard to irrigate early and late

• Too wet can be fine but needs to be bedded up well.... good for spinach and long season crops as holds nutrients well

Soil temperature

Matching crops to soils

• different crops have different soil requirements

• sweet potatoes loves very sandy soil

• carrots need deep friable soils

• spinach is fine with clay as long as it is bedded up

• Melons love dry fertile soil

Fertility management

• Season extension is not easy on the plants...

• therefore we want the best environment we can create

• Our goal is to create the BEST soil we can

Disease management

• Season extension is exposing crops to sub-ideal environments

• Early and late plantings are more vulnerable to wet, cold conditions which make them ripe for disease.

• As well, the soils are not warm which means that leaf yellowing/dieback is more pervasive- which leads to more disease.

Plant Health=

Disease Resistance

Fighting disease...• good soil health

• variety selection

• adding mycorrhizae

• not working the soil too early or too late- the clump test

• good air circulation- giving plants necessary space, and uncovering so they can dry out

• clean seed, propagation trays, equipment

Sprays a last resort

• Regalia, rootshield, actinovate

• Oxidate

• Double nickel, greencure, milstop, copper

Planning our Season Extension

• look at what the market needs/is missing

• look at your weather patterns

• think about the growth patterns depending on the season

We need to make $40,000 an acre

Also need to make at least $40 an hour picking the crop

Works out to be $4.50 a bed ft

Micro Climates

• Occur on the top of a slope, by large bodies of water, in areas shielded by large natural barriers

• Can be 3-5 degrees warmer than surrounding areas

• Our Granville field is consistantly 3-4 degrees colder than the home farm

5-8˚

8-15˚

Growth rates

0

5

10

15

20

1/1 2/1 3/1 4/1 5/1 6/1 7/1 8/1 9/1 10/1 11/1 12/1

Outdoors Greenhoue

We always double our last few plantings

Frost-sensitive crops• Tomatoes

including cherries

• peppers

• eggplant

• cucumbers

• squash

• okra

• beans

• potatoes

• basil

Hardy Crops• Arugula

• Mesclun

• Lettuce Mix

• Spinach

• Asian greens

• Carrots

• Beets

• Scallions

• Leeks

• Brassicas

Succession plantings• Squash and cucumbers

• beans

• lettuce and greens

• radishes

• beets, carrots

• herbs

Pick an date...

And then just keep on planting.....

Get rid of the pre-conceived notions of when crops can be produced

Looking at frost dates

• how early can you reasonably plant sensitive crops without heat?

• use a construction heater for those few days that it gets cold

• have rowcovers at the ready...

Equipment

Flaming for early weed control

Flaming basics

• either used for stale seed bedding (before the crop is planted or blind cultivation (before the crop is up)

• idea situation: plant, wait till seeds are germinating but not above the soil yet, flame, seeds come up in weed free bed

• flame midday when plants and ground are dry

• hot as possible

For smaller droplet size

Transplanting

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Mulches

Why Mulch?

• ADDS ORGANIC MATTER!

• stops erosion

• reduces water requirements

• keeps workers and produce clean during harvesting

• Keeps worms happy

Bio-360

• starts to breakdown within 2-3 months- gone by spring

• twice the cost of regular plastic($350 for 5000 ft)

• NOT OMRI yet- Certified in Europe, Canada

• has changed the way we farm- we are now adding organic matter easily while growing crops

Rowcover

What do row covers actually do?

• Trap heat and warms the soil

• reduce wind desiccation

• cut sunscalding/burning on crops

• keep frozen greens from thawing too quickly

• traps moisture reduces irrigation needs

Rowcover Weights/thicknesses

• .4 oz (PRO 15

• .5 oz (PRO 19

• .9 oz (PRO 30

• 1.2 oz (PRO 40

• 1.25 oz (Typar 518

• Nursery covers

Row cover thoughts

• Cheap, thin covers are not worth the money

• multiple layers trap heat between them

• hoops (ours are custom) keep rowcover off growing tips and from burning greens in the fall

• covers can increase disease pressure through trapping moisture

Fill with pea gravel so they don’t freeze

Crop Specifics

Field GreensSee Session one

High Tunnel crops

tomatoes

Cultural techniques• greenhouse plantings are

trellised- 2 leaders clipped up

• hoop house plantings are basket-weave with 7 ft rebar in between 8 ft 2 x 2 stakes

• we pick into 2 gallon mushroom buckets and sort in washing shed

Tomato culture

• All are grafted

• Maxifort Rootstock

• Geronimo, Big Beef, Rebelski

• Great White, German Johnson, Black Prince, Cherokee Purple, Indigo rose

Peppers

• Almost all done inside now

• Ace for green

• Carmen, Flavorburst for colored

• stake for maximum production

Hoophouse planting

• transplanted through black landscape cloth

• 2’ x 2’ spacing

• drip under cloth, 1 run per row

• plastic put on several days after planting to reduce stress on plants

Staked 3-4 weeks after planting

Varieties

• Socrates- smaller euro type- really good flavor

• Tasty Jade- long japanese type, customers love them!

• Diamant- good pickling variety- really productive!

• Need to pick self-pollinating varieties because of pollination

1st week of May

last week of may, our last frost date!

Strawberries

• Annual bed system- plant fall, harvest spring, till under

• Variety Chandler

• Buy in tips, propagate ourselves, plant in September

Paul Arnold Pleasant Valley Farm

French Beans

Can be direct seeded in a hoophouse 3rd week of April

rows 24” apart seeded with Earthway seeder

Transplanting

• 2-3 seeds per cell, planted as a multi-plant

• Transplants need to be much smaller (10 days max)

• water in well (reduce stress as much a possible)

• Maxibel best variety

• we transplant 2 rows apart on the bed (plants 12 inches apart) with drip tape down the center

• Need to pick every 2 days to keep small

• Early season beans can command up to $6 lb

• 1.6 lbs per bed ft = $9 per bed ft

• need consistent irrigation

Alliums

Seeded February transplanted April

• Prince/Pontiac

• Redwing

• Gold Coin

• bridger and forum for overwintering

Planting overwintered onions

Ambition or Picador for shallots

Leeks

• plants custom grown in Florida

• 3 rows on plastic, 8” apart

• Megaton and Lexton, Bandit for winter

Green Garlic

• planted with regular garlic

• great mild garlic flavor

• harvesting by May 1st under covers

• $9 per bed ft.

Cover with mini-tunnel in the spring for up to 3 weeks earlier

Scallions

Winter Squash

• mix of varieties to keep it interesting

• butternut and kubocha store best

• Green plastic can increase yeilds and prevents discoloration

• Honey bear, jester, sunshine, pinnacle, waltham, metro

Brussel Sprouts

Planted June 1st

Churchill and Dimitri

Store until February

Cabbage

• Storage #4

• Ruby Perfection

Deadon

photo courtesy

of beautifulc

ataya

Roots

Kohlrabi

• Spring seeding April 1st or so

• Fall planting seeded July 1st -10th

• transplanted on biotello- 3 rows 8” in row

• harvest before severe freeze

By the numbers...

• We charge $3 a lb or 2.50 each for large fist sized

• good yield equals around $8 per bed foot

• transplanted as soon as will come out of trays.

• average fertility, although needs extra boron

• varieties: winner, kolibri, kossack

Celariac

Sweet potatoes

• Favorite variety Covington

• on plastic, 2 rows 1 ft apart

• Planted with waterwheel

Yield 4 lbs per bed ft

Parsnips

Cultivating constantly

Growing mid-summer

Spring harvest for sweetest flavor

Pulling them out of the mud

Parsnip Numbers

• 2.5 lbs per foot @$3/lb = $7.50 bed ft

• strong demand for holiday season

• balance left in ground till spring

• * does take entire season 7-10 months for crop

Potatoes

Early Potatoes

• greensprout or chit

• grow on clear plastic, under row cover

• water regularly

• dig when first flowers appear

Turnips/radishes

• Member of the Crucifer family so appreciate high boron as well as steady moisture

• Hakurei turnip variety preferred during the summer and fall

• For radishes, Rover and Cherriette preferred.

Specialty Radishes

• Red Meat

• Nero Tondo

• Alpine

• Miyashige

Carrots

• Weed control is critical, a mixture of stale bedding, flame weeding and mechanical cultivation is key

• Bolero, Nelson, Rainbow and Yellow Sun are preferred varieties

• Watch fall carrots for alternaria and spray with copper

• Carrots LOVE loose friable soil, bed up or grow on loose, sandy soil.

Seeded by July 10th

• Bolero

• Yellow Sun

• purple haze

• rainbow

Sunchokes

• Plant in October

• Harvest in Fall or early spring

Beets

• Kestrel, Chioggia Guard-mark, and Touchstone Gold preferred varieties.

• keep well irrigated and supplied with boron to decrease scab

• Need lots of nitrogen to keep tops healthy

value added

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